The parishes of Barton Bendish St Andrew & Barton
Bendish All Saints & St Mary lie in western Norfolk. The village shared
between the two churches is about midway between the market towns of Swaffham
and Downham Market and just to the south of the A1122 which links them.
It is certainly strange but not unique in Norfolk for such a small village
to have two churches, the village is just a cluster of cottages around
a group of small lanes. Originally, however, there were three All Saints
was only demolished in 1788 and merged with St Mary.

St Andrew's church is the major church of the village and sits in the
heart of the populous. Much of the church is of an early date for Norfolk
with features giving a date of around the end of the 12th Century. The
body of the church is a curious mixture of flint and the local carrstone.

A single standard 800-entry register book covers
the period of this transcription and beyond. This register is filmed on
Microfilm MF1662 in the collection of the Norfolk Record Office and from
which this transcript was produced. The filming is a recent one and of excellent
quality, the images being clear and with good contrast throughout. As a
result this was a relatively straightforward transcript to produce and it
is to be hoped few errors will have crept in to its compilation.